Sunday, 24 February, 2002. 07:31:44 PMThe Washington Post also picked up the story about Ashcroft and his large mouth.
Sunday, 24 February, 2002. 01:03:16 PMAshcroft quote from the article:
Last month, he angered Muslims when he allegedly said that Christianity is a faith in which God sends his son to die for you," while Islam is "a religion in which God requires you to send your son to die for him. "
Wow. What a fool.
Sunday, 24 February, 2002. 01:01:09 PMArticle about more of Ashcroft's stupidity
here.
Saturday, 23 February, 2002. 11:14:12 AMAT&T mail service was
interrupted by a spam attack.
Saturday, 23 February, 2002. 02:35:26 AMI arrived in Austin alright. I fly back to NYC on Monday morning.
Friday, 22 February, 2002. 01:53:32 PMI leave for the airport in a half hour, but my tickets haven't arrived yet.
Everything got left for the last minute.
Friday, 22 February, 2002. 11:32:16 AMI'm catching a plane back to Austin tonight. I'll be back in NYC on Sunday
night.
Wednesday, 20 February, 2002. 03:48:33 PMYesterday and today I took the W train down to 14th street, and then the 6
train from 14th to 23rd street. I was able to easily see the abandoned 18th
street station. It's completely dark, and covered in grafitti. It's also a
lot smaller than the current stations. 50 years ago the trains must have been
shorter.
Monday, 18 February, 2002. 12:37:31 AMThere's an abandoned subway station at 18th street on the 6 line between 14th
and 23rd streets. I'm going to go all the way down to 14th street tomorrow
and look out the train to try to glimpse the station. It was one of the
original subway stations, and was closed in the 1940's. Illumination was
partly provided by glass blocks in the sidewalk that let light in. Those
blocks are now gone, and the station is dark except when lit by a passing
train. Over the years the subway system here in NYC has been updated and
changed, and there are a variety of abandoned tracks, stations, platforms,
and station levels that can still be viewed from the current subway routes.
When the 18th street station was in operation, it was known as the 18th and
4th Avenue station. 4th Avenue was renamed to Park Avenue after WWII.
Sunday, 17 February, 2002. 11:26:59 PMThe rumors of the rudeness of the people of New York City are definitely false.
As a visitor to the city, I've found that there are always plenty of people
who will notice that you're lost, and they offer to help without being asked.
Saturday, 16 February, 2002. 06:27:33 PMThis is my second weekend in NYC. I will probably be going home this Friday,
if everything gets finished. Last weekend I saw the American Natural History
museum on Saturday, and I bought two photographs in Central Park. On Sunday
I saw the Intrepid Air and Space Museum, which was quite spectacular. The
Intrepid is a beautiful carrier with a long battle history. Today I took the
subway down to Chinatown and walked around there. It's hard to remember, but
I think that the Chinatown in San Francisco was larger that this one. I
stopped in to a restaurant for lunch and had some really excellent food. It's
hard to find good Chinese food in Austin. And, it only cost $5 for me to eat.
After that I walked down to the Brooklyn Bridge and took a couple photos, then
I walked down Water Street all the way to Battery Park at the tip of
Manhattan. The Statue of Liberty still looks great. I walked up to the World
Trade Center site and took some photos and walked around. On the northwest
corner of the site there are piles of things that people have left; flowers,
candles, flags (of many nations), cards, photos. The plywood barriers that
keep the crowds back are covered with inscriptions from visitors. The entire
area is still covered in gritty dust. I suppose a lot of that is from the
ongoing cleanup of the site. I just got back to the hotel.
Thursday, 14 February, 2002. 09:05:46 PMAbout the Olympic figure skating controversy: the Russians deserved to win
the gold. I think the only thing more stupid than figure skating is figure
skating fans that take it too seriously.
Tuesday, 12 February, 2002. 05:33:35 PMRemember to install lsof.
Tuesday, 12 February, 2002. 04:47:12 PMWhatever happened to Becca Borowski? While talking to my colleague here in
New York, we got on the subject of old BBS's. My all-time favorite was
the Elephant's Graveyard back in Okemos, MI. It was run by Becca Borowski
who was a student at Okemos High School. Her board didn't have any 'wares
to download, but it did seem to attract people like professors, and I can
remember that there was an author who lived in Okemos who logged on often.
The board shut down when she went off to college. A search on google
doesn't reveal anything, so I can only assume that she got married and
changed her name. It would be really cool if she's got a web log out there
where a few professors and authors argue about politics and philosophy.
Tuesday, 12 February, 2002. 02:44:55 PMVectors in STL are guaranteed to be contiguous in memory. That means that
C functions that require a traditional pointer to an array are fully able
to use a pointer to the first element of a vector as if it was a pointer to
the first element of an array.
The expression &v[0] can be used to get a pointer to the first element of a
vector that is usable by C code. An iterator can also be used, using the
expression &*v.begin() or &*v.end().
Thursday, 07 February, 2002. 03:57:12 PMIt's raining today in NYC, but I have my umbrella with me.
Tuesday, 05 February, 2002. 03:12:48 PM"Canada is so far from god, and so near to America."
Tuesday, 05 February, 2002. 11:51:47 AMI've got my Credit Suisse First Boston badge now, so I'm official. The subway
trip to work today was easier than yesterday. I didn't miss my stop, so it
took just a few minutes. There are fewer police on the streets now. Apparently
there were more police because of the World Trade Organization conference
that was held in this city. A few protesters were arrested, but nothing
serious. The news reports about the protesters were strongly biased against
them, which I found to be strange. I recall more balanced coverage of the
protests in previous years.
Monday, 04 February, 2002. 10:50:18 PMOne day down in NYC. The subway system here is the crudest one that I have
ever seen, but I've only seen a few systems. The subways in Washington D.C.
were new
in the 1970's, and they are still well maintained. The stations are large
and bright, with clear signs. All the trains are upholstered in the
same orange fabric that was fashionable when they were built. I only rode
the subway in Amsterdam once when my Renault suffered a flat tire and I had
to ride a surface train to Centraal Station and take the subway back out to
the Rije where Apollo House was located. In Stockholm, I rode the train most
every day to work, unless the weather was nice enough to walk. I took the
subway all around the city. Each station was furnished with a piece of art
commissioned just for the subway. One art piece that I remember was a large
standing bronze penguin, with a perfect cube about 4 or 5 feet on a side
attached to the bird's belly. I wish that I had a photograph of it, maybe
someday I'll return and get one. The subways in New York are dingy, dirty,
crowded places. The tracks are uneven, and the trains sway and lurch
constantly when they are moving. Passengers on the train can remain on the
trains for as long as they please. I've observed many obviously homeless
people sleeping on the trains. I always stand on the train despite the uneven
ride. I saw a woman sitting next to a homeless man, holding her scarf over her
nose to guard against the smell. Despite all that, the trains arrive
exactly on time, and they feel quite safe to me.
There are policemen in every station, and sometimes on the
trains. Policemen are everywhere in the city it seems. On any particular block
it is possible to see more than one a minute. During the cab ride in last
night we passed a national guard checkpoint. Apparently there are still
many soldiers throughout the city. They used to actively stop and search all
the traffic going past their checkpoints, but they are just watching now.
Monday, 04 February, 2002. 06:04:33 PMReview of the Park Central Hotel, New York City
Pros:
nice location, just south of Central Park.
nice lobby
Cons:
Tiny room
Inadequate working space in room (tiny round table)
My phone cord was broken and wouldn't stay in phone.
Hot water faucet on bathroom sink doesn't line up with cold water faucet
Shower faucet handle loose.
Heater control broken, room either too hot or too cold.
Windows don't open.
Local calls cost $1.50 for the first 30 minutes, 0.15 cents/min thereafter
No newspaper in the morning.
Overall rating: 3 out of 5 stars.
The telephone charge is a fatal flaw, making this hotel completely
unsuitable for business travellers. If NYC wants to attract high tech
tourists, they MUST make this practice illegal.
Monday, 04 February, 2002. 05:13:06 PMI've been making plans for my sightseeing while I'm here. I'm going to see the
Intrepid Air and Space museum and the American Natural History Museum (and
the new Haydn Planetarium). Both of them are open from 10-5 Saturday and
Sunday, so I'll decide then which one I'll see first. The Haydn Planetarium
is supposedly really nice. There was some controversy about the meteorite
that is in the building. Apparently it's a nickel-iron meteorite weighing
several hundred pounds (or maybe even bigger) that has a long history as
a Native American religious icon. They want it back. The trouble is that this
meteorite forms the centerpiece of the new museum, and to remove it would
involve quite a lot of demolition and reconstruction, as well as a
reworking of the other exhibits. Oops! The Intrepid should be really neat
as well. But when I think of the Intrepid, I can't help thinking that it's
a damn shame that the Big E was scrapped after the war. It was a crime to
scrap the most decorated warship in American naval history. So, I really wish
that it was the Enterprise Air and Space Museum that I was going to visit.
Monday, 04 February, 2002. 04:55:46 PMThe only other person here with me in NYC is Chris. Next to his cube there's
a guy that he refers to as "Bubba". I noticed him as soon as I walked into
the office. His cube has a row of license plates that Compaq used to give out
that say LINUX, and under that "Live Free or Die". He also has quite a number
of photographs of Elvis in his cube, and he sports a nice set of porkchop
sideburns. He wears sunglasses all day because he claims that bright lights
hurt his eyes. Chris thinks that Bubba's drinking problem might have something
to do with that, but I wonder if it's because the glasses make him look
more like Elvis. Or perhaps his drinking problem is meant to make him look
more like Elvis... Today for lunch he had two Whoppers, explaining his
large size. The illusion of Bubba as a modern Elvis is complete.
Monday, 04 February, 2002. 03:44:33 PMI'm at Credit Suisse today. The plane flight from Austin to NYC was OK, I
slept the whole way. After I arrived in NYC, a cabbie met me at the baggage
pickup, which I thought was somewhat irregular. But, what the hell. I walked
out with him and he had his cab parked in the ramp. It didn't look like
a regular cab. It was a late model Lincoln with a nice leather interior. It
turned out to be a real cab, because it had a cab plate. After I got to the
hotel I went down to a deli, bought some food, and took it back to my room.
I couldn't fall asleep until 3 AM because I slept on the plane. That's OK,
because it was really 2 AM Austin time, which is my normal Sunday night
bedtime.